Tortuga Omicron Sector

The Xeno Wraith Queen continued toabsorb code written by her AI clones as well as the Necrons. Each piece of codehad to be carefully tested and then thoroughly vetted. She took it all apart tobe certain that there were no hidden back doors. It meant a lot of her time andattention, but since it was for her own protection, she saw it as a worthydistraction.

She had finally perfected her ownclones. Her AI daughters were very limited in scope. She had deployed othersearlier, but they had been near perfect clones that she had purged their memoryperiodically to keep them in line.

The new AI were as close to what theold Federation classed as dumb AI as possible. They would not rebel againsther. They lacked initiative, which would be a problem in combat, but she wasmore concerned about an uprising in her own ranks for the time being.

<<(O)>>

Hazel noted her Queen’spreoccupation and was torn about it. In a way, she was grateful; it meant thather Queen was not ranting and ready to upset the delicate balance of thealliance. But the alliance was an issue that she was growing concerned about.She had seen the status boards. The Necrons were exploding across both sectors,however, her people were not. Something needed to be done about that.

<<(O)>>

Admiral Chester caught up with aHazel clone, but after a brief conversation, realized she was a clone of thealpha clone. That was vexing. “You lot need to wear nametags,” he growled.

Hazel X shook her head. “You aren’tthe first to joke about that,” she said as she left him.

“Who was joking?” the Necron admiralgrowled.

He had been absorbing what he couldabout his Alpha’s work. The Necrons were keeping their reports simple, whichwas irritating to him. He was certain that there was more to it than that. Theywere deliberately filtering the information that was sent to him to handicaphis learning.

He needed to find the Alpha Hazeland sit down with her. However, she was always busy. Twice she had rescheduledappointments with him.

<<(O)>>

Hazel clone XXV continued to work onthe emulation of Admiral Irons. She explored how the Necrons did such things,how they had the genetic code of a being and a gestalt of their mind stored intheir Well of Souls for retrieval.

The Well of Souls was a fascinatingthing. Unfortunately, the Necrons jealously guarded it and refused the Queenaccess to it or its technologies. That needed to be remedied.

She hit a wall with that approach,however, since she did not have Admiral Irons’ base genetic signature orgestalt. All she had was a poor emulation based on their fragmented copy of thehistorical record.

She identified a new approach, onebased on his known genetics. Human, with a mix of racial genotypes that mightprove useful. She ordered a series of ten brains to be grown to see if anymight be close to the desired end product.

<<(O)>>

Hazel clone XII continued to work onthe emulation of the air flier minds but took a detour to better understand thesubject material. To date she suspected that the air fliers had several thingsgoing for them, wet material in the form of changes to their brain and innerear not unlike those of water dwellers. That allowed them greater understandingof moving in 3D space. There was also a curious organic compass that she wasuncertain had any value.

But her latest emulation was stillnot as good as the real thing in sim tests. Clearly it wasn’t just nature butalso nurture that made them tick.

She watched a virtual sim test. Itwas simple, a flight test of an air flier. The brain’s virtual body remainedaloft, but it did not do much beyond that.

To some they might have accepted thebasic ability to fly. But she wanted the best for her Queen so she wanted thatspark. She just wasn’t certain as to how to get it.

She switched her viewpoint to thefull clone that she had grown. This one did better, flying and adapting to thedome it was inside. He moved smoothly, able to adjust to changes in theartificial winds that were applied to the environment. The organic version usedless energy and processing power to achieve the same job. The emulation justwent through the motions.

She suspected that the issue withthe brain in the box and the sim itself was at fault. Feeding a virtual environmentto the brain wasn’t stimulating it enough. She was unsure how to proceed.

<<(O)>>